The Filing Cabinet

"The Filing Cabinet," which covers compliance with the Dodd-Frank Act and the Sarbanes-Oxley Act, as well as other regulatory action from the Securities and Exchange Commission, executive compensation, and shareholder activism, is written by CW staff writer Joe Mont. Mont welcomes questions, comments, and statements from readers on SEC filing matters and will address them here when appropriate. Readers can contact him at joe.mont@complianceweek.com.

Critics of the Department of Labor’s controversial “fiduciary rule” say it should instead be promulgated by the SEC. Now, for the first time in years, the Commission has launched a public comment process on the matter.

After months of parsing through comment letters and collecting financial industry feedback, the SEC is ready to inject itself in the controversial effort to create a fiduciary duty regulation for broker-dealers and investment advisers. The Commission has scheduled an open meeting on Wednesday, April 18, to debate a potential rule proposal.

The SEC has proposed new rules that offer safe harbor protections for research broker-dealers who provide research reports on mutual funds, ETFs, registered closed-end funds, and business development companies.